Floor and Foam Puzzle Reviews

We bought this for my 5 year old when she was 2 and she still loves this puzzle. All of her cousins do the puzzle when they come over and now her younger sister loves it too. It has held up well for all the use it has gotten!

We have 4 of these Lights, Camera... Interaction floor puzzles for our son. He started with them in the winter when outdoor activities are limited. He was about 1 year and 9 months then, and very quickly this became a favorite daily ritual. It built eye-hand coordination and dexterity, associative skills, naming skills, and of course self-confidence. After a few days he was able to do them by himself, always following a certain pattern (like starting with the tractor, its tires, then the sheep, etc). Soon he learned to identify edge and corner pieces. By having several puzzles, over time the lessons for puzzling became generalized. After the puzzle is complete, he does a "puzzle dance" to celebrate, stomping on the completed work of art! This is a wonderful indoor activity, assuming one has enough floor space or a very firm carpet to spread it out. Also makes a great gift. Melissa & Doug, who make the puzzles, should be thanked and congratulated on an affordable, durable starter puzzle.

My daughter (now 28 months) has loved this puzzle for over 1 year! She first loved seeing the excellent barn/farm animal picture come together like magic when she was young. Then she enjoyed putting the pieces we gave her in the spots we'd show her. Now she knows to look at the picture on the box for help, separate all the edge and middle pieces and can put it together pretty much on her own. (Although she loves an audience when putting puzzles together!) We now own six large floor puzzles, although this one is still the favorite. The alphabet train puzzle is a close second and is great for helping my daughter learn the alphabet visually in order. We sing the alphabet song from the beginning each time so she can figure out which letter piece comes next. These puzzles are really fun and are excellent quality. Also, this barn picture comes in a large knob wooden version as well, which my 8 month old son is beginning to enjoy! I highly recommend these puzzles for any child just under a year old and up to probably age 5 or 6. (The neighbor's kids play with them just as happily and they are 5 and 7.) I'm sure my daughter's love of puzzles began with this barn puzzle.

My three year old loves this puzzle and it has helped her learn her letters. We even play games with it - kind of like "I spy" for the next letter. The peices are large and easy for her to assemble. Well worth the investment.

This has got to be one of the best puzzles or tools to teach the alphabet. My little one just received this for his birthday and has put it together all by himself already (he's 3)! It teaches great motor dexterity as well as the alphabet and 26 animals. He loves to make all their sounds as he goes along. It stretches clear across the kitchen floor and it's a bunch of fun for the cat too! My son is getting a big jump on the alphabet with this puzzle and it's just a great investment. Here's a little hint though. Don't wait until the last minute to get it for Christmas. I tried last year and it was sold out for 2 months! Get it now and don't be disappointed!

I bought this puzzle for my 2 yr old daughter for Christmas and she loves it. She doesn't know her letters yet, but she can find all 'passengers' on the train and we say the letter for the piece that she is looking for. Now, she is starting to know what letters we are looking for. This is a step up from the alphabet song and leading into letter recognition. The pieces are thick and durable. She stands on them and there is no wear and tear. This is a great toy for any preschooler! Wonderful 'hands-on' toy!

My 3 year old son enjoys his 24 piece grocery store puzzles and was able to spend a good 15-20 minutes assembling them, at first with help from mommy and then by himself. I thought it was time to try a more difficult puzzle- this was a good next step. He and I put this one together- he is not ready for it on his own, but it is not so difficult that he gets frustrated if we work together. As another reviewer pointed out, this is a good puzzle to teach 2 important puzzle skills that 24 piece puzzles don't quite get at: #1: to look at the box as a reference and #2: to start by making the outside border and then filling in the middle. The quality is outstanding- it blows grocery store puzzles out of the water. The colors are beautiful, but lots of similar shades of brown and green which make it slightly more difficult. My son is wanting to know the names of the different dinosaurs now. If you want to sit down and help your toddler with this puzzle at first it is a great one to get! We love this company and their products!!!

We bought this as a gift for our two-year old nephew, and he absolutely loved it! Like many little boys, likes anything dinosaur, and he also enjoys puzzles, so this was perfect. The pieces are very sturdy and can certainly survive some toddler abuse. The puzzle can be used again and again, but the finished work is so attractive that it also makes a cool wall hanging for a kid's bedroom--it looks great in my nephew's room! Highly recommended.

We stepped up to this puzzle after mastering the farm animals puzzle, which had fewer pieces and was relatively easy to assemble without looking to the box for help. The dinosaur puzzle, on the other hand, was great for teaching my almost-4 year-old the ins and outs of puzzle assembly.

We start by looking at a piece and determining what it's a part of. ("This is someone's green neck. Who needs a green neck?") Because the dinosaurs are all shades of browns and greens, we next match the piece to the box, then lay it in the appropriate spot. We're currently working on learning about "corners" and "edges".

The construction is excellent, as with most LCI products. The pieces all fit snugly and unambiguously and are printed on durable, glossy stock...

My 4 year old nephew just loves this puzzle! It's the best! The large pieces make it easy for him to manueuver.

We got this puzzle for our 3 kids last Christmas. It is big, bright, sturdy and very educational...even for me! Of course the first thing we noticed was the picture of the Twin Towers over New York. (Not sure if they are still making them like that)This is something I will keep forever, and that my kids will continue learning from for years to come.

My four-year-old has been obsessed with this puzzle.

The geographical pictures give grownups things to talk about (e.g., "There's the Golden Gate; you've seen that." or "Do you remember where the corn grows?"). Also, the pieces are extremely sturdy & flat so it locks together easily. This reduces the frustration factor.

I love this mat! I got this for my 9 month old daughter and she immediately took to it. She loved the vibrant colors and the fact that she can pull out the letters, within a couple of days she found out that she could pull the whole mat appart (a lot of work for the parent...but all comepletely worth it). Friends have pulled it appart and have used it as a hop-scotch board and built things out of it. The foam is a little flimsy though, so I would recomend watching children when they are teething and figuring out the capabilities of their teeth. But over all I love this and have recomended it to many people.

We have hardwood floors, which are nice, but when you have a baby who wants to be on the floor, it's hard on everyone. So, we went out and bought this. It's much better than the floor, but it's not carpeting. They're pretty durable - my son has taken all of the letters and the numbers out and put them back and they don't seem to be very worn yet! (He's 18 months and we've had it for at least 12 months.) For a long time, that was one of the things he enjoyed doing the most, taking the letters out, walking around with them, and chewing on them. He would also put them back in later, but not as often as he would take them out. I didn't really worry much about the small pieces - the small circles for the inside of the eight, six, zero, b's, etc - since we're with him when he plays with this. But if you are, you can simply take them out and put them away for later. Of course, that means that your child will be able to pull out the letters and numbers more easily, but that's part of the fun. (Little ones have a hard time getting much of a gripe on the letters and numbers when they're pushed flush with the blocks.) Also, I think that it's nice to have the alphabet out and some numbers. My one complaint is that the one we got, when it's put together has six vertical stripes through all the letters, but then the numbers don't continue it. I guess I wish ours was more random, which some are.

Love the ABC mat concept and the vivid colors! The mat's letter "I" was missing. Tried to pull up D&S Products International's website, ... and it just came up a general directory page called Retroglo Directory Page. I searched for Fun Foam Letters Mat and it came up amazon.com and ToysRus. Said that the product is no longer stocked or has been discontinued. Did a Google Search and found no D&S Products International or RetroGlo--only sourceguides came up when I even plugged in the address of D&S. ... I read other products reviews of this mat and others are missing borders and letters as I am.

I got this for my children's room, a 3 year old boy and a 6 month old girl. We love sitting on it and playing since it makes a soft playmat on our hardwood floors as well as minimizing noise. It's very large so the family fits easily on it! My son loves to take all the letters out and put them back where they belong or jump between letters. He already knew all the letters when I got this mat but it has only emphasized his fascination with letters and added a new dimension to our word and letter play as well as other games. Cars and balls roll easily on it. The mat has numbers 0-9 which is good. The 6 month old has spit and drooled on it a bit and I have found it easy to clean under running water and wipe dry.

I liked the idea of this toy. I wanted a soft mat for our son to play on and I liked the puzzle factor. It just hasn't been a toy our son is interested in. Maybe when he is older he will put the pieces together, but it seems too difficult for him at this age. He just tears it all apart, and so it is useless as a mat. I end up piecing it all together, which is time consuming, and then he destroys it. I've put it away for when he is older, and I'll try it again then.

We registered for this mat hoping that it would be great to use as cushioning in the play room and a fun learning tool as our baby grew. And it does cushion, when it's not falling apart. The edging and the centers to the letters and numbers, and the letters and numbers themselves, are always popping up as our baby crawls on them, catching her hand or foot the wrong way. It just doesn't stay together - we've tried everything. It's really more annoying than it's worth. Now we use it outside under our daughter's kiddie pool for a little cushioning - I don't care if it blows away at this point. What a waste of money. They sell larger squares w/o letters and numbers - I'll maybe try those instead.